Eastern Cape:
ANC ticks up despite
PE conflict

Internal party strife in Nelson Mandela Bay
notwithstanding, the ANC crossed the 70% mark in the Eastern Cape.

The Democratic Alliance (DA) increased its share of the vote in the Eastern
Cape by almost half again between 2009 and 2014, but in a pattern established
by other provinces in which vote counting had been completed, its gains came
not at the expense of the ANC, but of the Congress of the People (Cope).

The ANC increased its portion of the provincial vote to 70.1%
compared to its 68.8% in the previous general election.

Cope, which had easily made it into second place in 2009,
was beaten by the ANC, the DA, the United Democratic Movement (with an unusual third place) and the
Economic Freedom Fighters (somewhat under its national average at 3.5%). But the once influential
Cope did manage to beat the African Independent Congress (AIC), thought to owe many of its ballots to voters confusing it with the ANC, by 9 343 votes.

In Nelson Mandela Bay, the Port Elizabeth metro, the
ANC’s share of the provincial vote came in below a majority, at 48.8%.
Should
future government elections mirror that result, a coalition could conceivably
wrest control of the metro from the ANC – and gain the right to say it “owns” Nelson Mandela – but that coalition would have to include around a dozen
wildly disparate parties.

The ruling party performed better in other urban areas,
claiming 67% of the provincial vote in the East London area and 56.6% in the
Mthatha area.

Phillip de Wet

Phillip de Wet writes about politics, society, economics, and the areas where these collide. He has never been anything other than a journalist, though he has been involved in starting new newspapers, magazines and websites, a suspiciously large percentage of which are no longer in business. PGP fingerprint: CF74 7B0F F037 ACB9 779C 902B 793C 8781 4548 D165 Read more from Phillip de Wet